My Houzz: Zen Meets Eclectic in Tel Aviv
http://www.decor-ideas.org 12/17/2013 14:20 Decor Ideas
Ever since they purchased their 1970s apartment in 2010, Yosi Lavy and Nesh Bruic dreamed of fixing it up using secondhand finds. Lavy, a shiatsu massage therapist, and Bruic, a craftsperson and furniture maker, rented the second-floor apartment for two years while they thought through their design, then devoted two full months to renovating it.
The pair removed a wall to open up their main living space, and converted one balcony into a laundry area and another into a massage studio. Handmade details and custom furniture pieces fit their compact space perfectly.
Houzz at a Glance
Who lives here: Nesh Bruic and Yosi Lavy
Location: Tel Aviv, Israel
Size: 60 square meters (646 square feet); 1 bedroom, 1 bathroom and a fitness room
The first thing Bruic and Lavy did was tear down the exterior wall to extend their home onto the long, narrow balcony that stretched across their front windows. Tall sidewalk trees bring the outdoor feeling in.
The couple uses some of the leaves from their potted plants for making tea.
Some of the walls came down during the renovation. Vinyl shutters and a closed room to the left had kept much of the sunlight from entering the apartment.
AFTER: “It was a long, boring balcony,” says Bruic. The windows now extend from the dining room to the bedroom, which has no door and is located behind the divider wall at left.
Bruic covered one of the pillars with wood from a client’s old floor. He used found items to create many of the furniture pieces, such as the leaning dresser festooned with an eclectic assortment of knobs.
The dining table was a gift from a friend. Bruic refinished some mismatched chairs and grouped them around the table. The house looks different every time you visit, as things are constantly changing.
The Hanukkah menorah on the table was made from a piece of pipe.
Art: Daphne Levy
Bruic says their most sentimental item is a coffee table made from an old pinball game. The game was Lavy’s first vintage purchase, made when he was 17.
Instead of building a wall to close off the bedroom, Bruic built a floor-to-ceiling closet unit that breaks up the space. Shelves above the bed are backed with glass to allow light into the rooms beyond.
The mannequin, named Street-Girl, is something Bruic found on the street and turned into a lamp.
The couple removed doorways and walls, opening the entry hall to the adjoining spaces.
AFTER: “I wanted a cube in the house,” says Bruic. Once the walls were taken down, he created a block-like bathroom across from the front door and covered it with grass cloth.
The existing bathroom door had only one window at the top, so Bruic revamped it by cutting out three more openings and adding textured red Plexiglas behind each one.
Bruic turned an open space into a cozy seating area. “The problem in a small house like this is the storage,” he says. The stair treads lift up to reveal storage compartments for items like camping gear, shoes, spare guest chairs and suitcases.
The chairs are flea market finds that Bruic reupholstered.
Bruic covered the platform and treads with bamboo that once lined furniture shipping containers. He applied black pigment to the surface to achieve a dusky finish.
Here is the bookcase behind the bedroom. The shelves were built with different depths, some for displaying photos and others for books. Bruic says the glass backing brings the outside inside.
A hallway connects the main living space to the kitchen and Lavy’s shiatsu studio, where he works with clients. The apartment’s entry is opposite the bathroom door.
Clock: Bravur, Ikea
Bruic renovated the kitchen using cabinets that a client was planning to throw away. The countertops are Caesarstone; the doors on some of the hanging cabinets above are rotated.
The left-hand door here leads to a small balcony that was turned into a laundry room. The custom cabinets to the right were built by Bruic and are used as a pantry.
The apartment was extended into another small balcony at the far end, creating Lavy’s shiatsu studio. Bruic made the rounded archway to create a Zen-like feeling.
Bruic also replaced the flooring and wall tiles in the bathroom. A collage of pages from 1970s issues of Paris Match covers the front vanity.
The side walls include framed nooks to hold items like toothbrushes and cologne. The top nook opens to the laundry room — perfect for throwing dirty clothes straight into the washer.
Bruic, shown here, has another passion: cooking. When he’s not designing and building homes, custom cabinetry or lighting fixtures, he can be found in the kitchen or scouring flea markets for his next project. Coincidentally, he and Lavy met at a flea market.
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